Navistar to cut 207 jobs, 37 more than originally planned

Lisle-based Navistar reported that it will cut 207 jobs when it stops making engines at its Melrose Park facility, according to state documents released Wednesday. This is 37 more jobs than originally announced.Daily Herald File Photo

Kim Mikus

Lisle-based Navistar reported that it will cut 207 jobs when it stops making engines at its Melrose Park facility, according to state documents released Wednesday.

That is 37 more jobs than the company announced last summer. The cuts are listed under the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act, or WARN report, for March. Businesses file WARN reports to give the state notice of the layoffs and the reports are issued monthly. Layoffs are expected to begin May 4, company spokeswoman Lyndi McMillan said Wednesday.

The company said in August that it will cease all engine production at its plant in Melrose Park by the second quarter of fiscal 2018. The company will continue the facility's transformation into Navistar's technical center, including truck and engine testing and validation as well as used truck sales and reconditioning, continuing the process that started in 2010.

"Ceasing production of engines at Melrose Park is a difficult decision, but represents another important step on our journey to strengthening the company's competitiveness," Navistar Chief Operating Officer Persio Lisboa said in a statement.

When the company's Hunstville, Alabama, facility stopped making midsize engines in 2014, that work moved to Melrose Park. Now that Melrose Park will stop making those engines, it will be an end of an era for that product. Ending the midsize engine production will save the company about $12 million annually, McMillan said.

The Melrose Park facility will not close and about 400 workers will remain, she has said.

A transformation of the Melrose Park facility began in 2010, when the company added a state-of-the-art truck testing and validation center at the 80-acre campus, complementing the existing engine test center there, and bringing hundreds of engineering jobs there from out of state.